I provide an insider's view of the modern business world based on my years of experience working as an executive and consultant within the Global 3000. I am the CEO for Raynforest Inc, an Influencer Marketing Network, and the author of Socialized! which some call “the playbook for Social Business”. Want to learn more? Follow me on Twitter @MarkFidelman, Facebook, or circle me on Google+.

The Rise of Social Salespeople

Sydney, the CEO of a mid-size advertising company was sitting in her office, when she got a call from one of her vendors. Her sales rep, Mike wanted to talk about his new offering. Sydney was busy and didn’t have time to talk right then. She was interested in hearing more, but didn’t have the time at that moment. She politely asked Mike if they could talk later. Mike said yes, but continued to ask more questions. Sydney again, said she needed to talk later, but Mike just wouldn’t let go. When she finally got rid of him, she went to Twitter and asked: “How do you deal with pushy sales reps, my sales rep from company A is driving me crazy.”

David works for company A’s competition. He follows Sydney on Twitter. He saw Sydney’s tweet and with in 10 minutes of the tweet called Sydney and asked for a meeting and got it.

This is a true story. It is one of thousands of successful social selling stories.

Social media is no longer about what someone had for lunch. Social media is more than just people complaining about their shoddy Internet connections or their constantly crashing software applications. Social media is more than just listening to a brand’s senseless new promotion. Social media is more than just a trivial tool of the self-absorbed and treating it that way will leave you out in the cold. Social media is now a powerful communication platform and communication will always be at the heart of selling.

The Point is: Using social media to sell = increased profits.

Selling through social channels (social selling) is the closest thing to being a fly on the wall in your customers, prospects and competitor’s world. Using Twitter, LinkedInLinkedIn, FacebookFacebook, and other social media – supplies information that is almost impossible to obtain through traditional means. A lead today can be someone complaining on Twitter that their current vendor is driving them crazy. It can be a question in a LinkedIn group. It can be a unassuming comment on a Facebook page. Today, leads are far more than a call from a friend, a business card from an event or a chance encounter on a flight.

The phrase; “Go where you customers are.” has always been true and now it’s truer than ever. Your customers and prospects use social media. Their employees use social media. Their fans and detractors use social media, and they are ALL talking. This chatter is information. Information the best and most sophisticated sales professionals are using to find qualified leads and grow sales. The best are using social selling right now to be where their customers are.

Communication has changed selling and the way we sell for years. Mail ended the carnival pitchman and catalogues were created. The phone put an end to the door-to-door sales, and cold calling was born. Now, social media is changing communication and how sales are made – yet again.

Today, buyers spend far more time researching and moving through the buying process before they engage vendors. Much of the buyer’s journey leverages social media. Social selling allows sales people to engage buyers much earlier in their journey.

Cold calling has traditionally been the approach of choice for hungry, driven sales people. However, according to a recent study by InsideView over 90% of CEO’s said they NEVER respond to cold emails or calls. The return on cold calling is drastically decreasing.

Replacing the decline in cold calling is the warmth of social engagement. Buyers are far more responsive to social media messages around relevant topics initiated by the sales person or the buyer. Remember, the definition of a lead has changed. When a potential customer complains they are frustrated, they are far more likely to engage with a sales person who responds to their frustration than a cold call pitching a product.

Customers are changing how they buy. They are engaging vendors much later in the sales cycle. They have access to more information than ever before. Their conversations, thoughts, frustrations and concerns are becoming increasingly more public and visible. Their customers are expressing their thoughts, frustrations, and concerns publicly. All of this is changing how sales is performed and how quota is met.

To play in this environment and to access this information means sales people need to embrace social selling. It means they need to have a Twitter account. It means they need to participate in LinkedIn groups. It means they need to comment on blogs. It may even require they learn about what someone is eating for lunch.

Indeed, learning what a potential customer had for lunch, may mean someone isn’t eating yours.

About the Co-Author

Jim Keenan has over 15 years of experience in sales leadership and leading sales teams. He’s been cited in Harvard Business Review, SoldLab Magazine, and Great Business Project Magazine. His blog was named one of the top 50 blogs by Top Sales World, and Sales Crunch as well as listed in Guy Kawasaki’s AllTop Blogs. A Twitter fan, Keenan was named by enterprise resource planning company SAPSAP as one of the top 30 sales experts to follow on Twitter.

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Great case study and explanation Jim. If you’re a salesperson these days, you MUST learn how to use social media properly and efficiently…there are so many opportunities that are being left on the table by those who refuse to recognize social media as a form of communication with their customers.

I am and always will be a salesman, I may have a weakness in the power close, but I am determined to use social tools to further my career and my passion to help people find what they want and need – great article. Thank you…

I think this article partially gets it. What really happened in the vignette was that the guy from Company B was conducting great intelligence gathering. But, he must also have worked to have fairly solid customer intimacy.

Looking at the diagram, it’s clear one must work hard to get in the door and provide a “capability” brief without going for the throat in terms of getting a sale. Let the prospective customer get to know you and your firm AND you need to get to know them. What if this customer is a big whiner? Is it worth having her as a client if she requires constant care and feeding beyond the value of the revenue she provides? She might be if there is a big sale to eventually be made, but maybe not.

Being on Twitter, FB, etc… isn’t the answer. They are just tools. So-called “Social Media” experts are pretty much self-licking ice cream cones and their advice is dubious at best, and tiresome for the most part. I’m on all the social media networks and have been well before people had ever heard of Twitter. A decision has to be made about how much information one should put out on the web (are you giving away your competitive edge?) and how much they should withhold.

There is no doubt you need to be on social media networks, but they’re not a panacea. In the end, you’ve got to KNOW your business and customers and become the expert they need.

There’s no question the basics still apply, but the methodologies and tools have changed. That’s what most people need to understand. You still need a good product, you still need a good relationship, but you can’t expect to cold call in this new social era and get results.

Agreed. I worked at a company that basically taught us everything on the social side, except social media didn’t exist, and yet insisted on 10 cold calls a day. The CEO and I had a great discussion about it and couldn’t agree. I moved on. They ended up getting bought out.

Accessibility is a pivotal factor in any successful business. From putting yourself out there to reach new clients to checking in with them on a regular basis, sales is a “people” business. It’s never about the product, it’s about catering to the wants and needs of the client and performing to the best of your abilities within the confines of your practice. That said, Facebook and Twitter are kings of accessibility. Nevertheless, connecting with one another face-to-face or verbally over the phone is still the best way to judge raw, relatively unfiltered reactions to proposals, insights, and criticism. The connotation of written word, especially on the Internet, can be misinterpreted or completely overlooked. No matter what happens in the realm of social media, sales is more about connecting with someone on a professional level; a ‘like’ or ‘tweet’ will only get us so far.

In fact, what someone ate for lunch might well turn into a business opportunity these days. From a social network update you might get to know what foods, drinks etc. a person likes — and if you happen to know, for example, that the person is the Head of Purchasing at a catering company, there’s your chance.

Even though I’m not the greenest of rookies in social media marketing, I’m still amazed almost every day how the networks provide new opportunities. I’m pretty sure the time and energy used on cold calling would yield more results if directed to social selling.

Since cold calling really is dead doing research on prospects using social media offers the opportunity to create a more targeted message to a potential customer. This article does a great job of highlighting that in this case study. The salesperson still has to create compelling content in the form of a message that is relevant to the prospect. Yes salespeople will still strike out but the batting averages should actually improve.